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Thursday, December 24, 2015

Umabo at Wijaya

The first time I tried out Umabo was two years ago and it was recorded on my old blog, which you can also read here. The little restaurant gives me a really good impression and I've visited it for a few times during the time I still have my French class at Institut Français Indonesia. This time, my brother were pretty persistent into visiting Umabo again and so we drive off here. Greeted by the kind staff, we got seated into the innermost of the restaurant that were closest to the kitchen. There were only a couple of parties seating in during the lunch hour, so we got ourselves comfortable easily in the small restaurant that has a 40-pax capacity. On that particular day, the given menu was displayed on a sheet of paper instead of their usual iPad since the display were off -- which my brother said to be unfortunate as he thinks the menu display on the iPad gave Umabo a certain 'edge' as he remembered his experience two years ago. Small detail aside, we proceed on munching of some of Umabo's umami goodness!

Fresh Milk (IDR 8.000)

Pink Limenade (IDR 18.000)

Disco Fries (IDR 29.000)

French fries topped with sliced jalapeños, shredded short ribs, gravy, scallion, cheese and chili flakes all mixed up into one interesting side dish. The fries comes with a good value as there were plenty of meat to go around and you can tell that every aspect of the dish is prepared well. The potato were cooked really well and served hot on the table, eating it doesn't feel greasy. But I don't think there were sufficient sauces as I find that the dish is lacking in gravy, but nonetheless the play of texture and flavor were still there.

Chicken Wings - 1 Kilogram (IDR 115.000)

Everytime you order chicken wings at Umabo you have the option to choose whether you want your wings to be fried naked or with jacket (battered) and there were four flavor options for its coating sauce: Coca-Cola, Hawaiian, Creamy Buffalo and Sriracha. As we picked out the 1-kilo serving we can pick two flavor for our jacketed chicken wings, which are the creamy buffalo and the sriracha chicken. The creamy buffalo ones are the one coated with the orangey sauce while the sriracha has a deeper red color.

I freaking love the creamy buffalo chicken wings. Served piping hot, the crunchy wings come with a spicy-sour-creamy sauce that really suits my liking. The usual sour buffalo wings were further elevated with a touch of dairy that balances the sourness really well. The last time I went here the sauce weren't served 'creamy' and I think this is a good innovation by Umabo. I love this. I just... love this. I wished we ordered the whole dish filled with the creamy buffalo wings.

The sriracha wings were also good indeed, but it is inferior in comparison to the creamy buffalo wings. The sriracha chili sauce were pretty thick coating and its spiciness can get a little bit overwhelming. As you eat more the flavor gets a little muted from the spiciness, hence why I far prefer the buffalo wings. I have yet to try the Coca-Cola sauce, which I will try soon via Go-Jek as I just found out Umabo is available for delivery through Go-Jek and Klik-Eat (although they cannot deliver it to my area from Klik-Eat). Even without the sauce, the wings were juicy and worth every penny! This very tray consists of 1-kilograms of a mixture of 6 thick drummettes and 6 flat-tips (basically six whole wings).

Laostian Umami-Bowl (IDR 48.000)

Minced beef, lemongrass, chili sauce, pickled onion and one freaking beautiful egg that I can tell is farm-fed gives an interesting flavor to this Southeast Asian-inspired dish. I really appreciate that Umabo introduces a flavor which is uncommonly heard of and used in Indonesia. The juicy beef mixes well with the chili sauce and the runny egg yolk (the egg is cooked to your preference, and boy their egg never disappoint) and it comes in a good portion especially for the price. What would improve the dish is if the rice were even seasoned prior to serving, but that we can counter-argue that with the fact that the white rice goes well to even out the flavor of the protein. Regardless, this is one delicious and interesting don and I would like to thank our kind server for recommending the Laostian :-)

Flame Burger (IDR 58.000)

140-grams beef patty, chili pepper relish, sriracha mayo, cheddar cheese, iceberg lettuce and a slice of pickle. Uma-Burger came in a pretty simple presentation: a pretty good burger and that's it. This flame burger were really flaming hot, I had one bite and the spiciness instantly kicks in. This was a good burger but that's it as I don't think the bun is anything special, but I appreciate their try to present unique combination of topping to the burger and that the sauce were really cared for as it was really tasty and say... umami.

You might wonder how many person does it take to finish this all and the answer is: two. Yup, my brother and I quickly devoured all the meal we had. We were even considering to try out some desserts but we were running out of time because my brother had an afternoon class by the time. There would definitely be a next time, for sure. I've made a mental checklist and there were lots to fill in! Maybe next time on a weekend so he can try out the breakfast menu that is specially prepared every Saturday and Sunday. Now I am reminded of their eggs benedict...